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Lameness ranks high on the list of reasons why veterinary delegates eliminate horses from competition. Although competitors don’t always agree with their decisions, according to a recent study, veterinary delegates of the Fédération Equestre Internationale (FEI) reasonably assess a horse’s ability to compete.

Common causes of musculoskeletal pain include soft tissue strains that occur during training or competition, joint inflammation, and osteoarthritis.

“Despite the best of care and prophylactic joint supplementation, athletic horses still become lame because of external stressors,” said Kathleen Crandell, Ph.D., a Kentucky Equine Research nutritionist.

To ensure the fitness, health, and welfare of horses at FEI events, veterinary delegates visually examine each horse at rest and at the walk and trot on a straight line. This type of exam is called a qualitative analysis because it uses no specific techniques or tools to measure lameness other than visual inspection.

“This qualitative analysis contrasts with concrete measurements, such as heart rate, which give a definitive value that can then be categorized as acceptable or not,” Crandell explained. “For example, a resting heart rate above 60 beats/min in endurance horses is cause for concern.”

As such, if an owner or trainer feels that a lameness assessment was inaccurate, there is no quantitative data to support either side of the disagreement, as there would be in the case of something tangible, like heart rate.

In this study, 12 horses were evaluated by three experienced veterinary delegates and one veterinary specialist. The examinations were performed live, and video recordings of those evaluations were reviewed 1 month and 12 months later by the same individuals.

The frequency of agreement between different veterinary delegates when judging fitness to compete was acceptable, just as high as routine lameness examinations. The intraobserver agreement was even higher, meaning that the same person made the same decision on whether a horse was fit to compete or not during all three examinations.

“In other words, the judgment of the veterinary delegates is found to be reliable when it comes to determining fitness to compete,” summarized Crandell.

*Serra Bragança, F.M., H. Brommer, A.J.M. van den Belt, et al. 2020. Subjective and objective evaluations of horses for fit-to-compete or unfit-to-compete judgement. Veterinary Journal 257:105454

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